Take a good look at Mark Zuckerberg. His photo is everywhere now that Facebook has filed its intent to become a public company. The older you are by comparison to him, the less value you will probably see in Facebook. He is 27 years-old, and I’m old enough to be his mother. I am not in the demographic that he targets. But I have a daughter his age, who values social networking sites and has taught me to appreciate them more than I otherwise might.
She is often too busy to make or answer individual phone calls. Instead, she updates her Facebook page to communicate simultaneously with friends and family members. Did she find the Abyssinian she was shopping for when I saw her last week? Duh, Finian’s photo is on Facebook together with comments from many of her friends and several cousins, who are sharing cat info, cat stories, and cat videos with her, an experience not unlike all of us living on the same block.
Following that example, Celebrations Wine Club at last has a Facebook page. My hope is that it will join us together in the same neighborhood, where we can enjoy informal exchanges. For example, in the last couple of weeks, San Francisco has been overrun by Italian winemakers, gathered here for the Gambero Rosso Tre Bicchierri tasting. Any Italian wine that receives the Tre Bicchierri accolade is one of the best of the best. The tasting is acknowledged by most people in the trade to be by far the most extraordinary one of the year, no matter which wines they may be associated with, whether Californian, German, French, Spanish and so on. And this is a town that hosts non-stop wine tastings. Imagine the privilege of tasting the best wines from a single country that produces so much wine. I will be posting photos and comments from the tasting on the Celebrations Wine Club Facebook page. You may be inspired to attend this yearly tasting tour on one of its stops in New York, Chicago, or here in San Francisco.
Club members often call me or email stories about their wine experiences. Now you can share these stories with one another as well as with me. I’m hoping that this Facebook page will be a resource for all. Did you prepare a particular meal for a wine that you received this month that was so terrific that you’d like to suggest it for others? A club member sent me two bottles of wine from a winery near his home in Georgia. They were both terrific. I can now pass on that info. Another club member sent me photos of a walking trip that he took through Italy. Have you ever thought of taking such a trip?
This is after all a business, so on the Celebrations Wine Club Facebook page, I can list various wines that I might have in the warehouse that you may have overlooked or forgotten to reorder. Some of them may have received the Tre Bicchierri award, and yes, that also means that Robert Parker and Wine Spectator gave it 90-plus scores.
I’m announcing a contest to further inspire you to go to the Celebrations home page, click the Facebook “Like” button at the bottom of the menu, and go to the Celebrations Wine Club Facebook page. On the first day of spring, March 21st, I’ll draw a name from the list of visitors and send that winner a two-bottle package from the Italian Collector Series. If you don’t currently subscribe to that tier, you may have noticed that its price is $112 plus shipping. Building a neighborhood requires a little effort. I’ll see you there.
How Italy sorts its wines
Italian labels carry a tier as well as a name, and the tier tells you how tightly the wine is tied to a place. The strictest level applies to small delimited zones with rules on grape varieties, yields, minimum aging and a tasting panel before release. Below it sits a broader appellation level, and below that a regional designation that allows far more freedom in what may be planted.
All of those national tiers now sit inside a European framework of protected designations, which is why the same bottle can carry both an Italian abbreviation and a European one. The European Commission explains how protected geographical indications and quality schemes work across member states. The practical effect is that a place name on a label is a legal claim rather than a marketing choice.
| Feature | Highest tier | Middle tier | Regional tier |
|---|---|---|---|
| Size of zone | Small and tightly drawn | Larger, often a valley or hill range | Broad, sometimes a whole region |
| Grape rules | Specific varieties and proportions | Specific varieties, wider latitude | Wide latitude, including international grapes |
| Aging minimums | Set by the rules for each wine | Sometimes set | Usually none |
| Panel tasting | Required before release | Required for some wines | Not required |
What a trade tasting is for
A walk-around trade tasting gathers dozens or hundreds of producers in one room, each pouring a few wines to an audience of importers, distributors, retailers, restaurant staff and press. Nothing is sold on the floor. The point is contact, since a producer without American representation is looking for an importer and an importer is looking for gaps in a portfolio.
The etiquette follows from the volume. Tasters spit, take notes as they go, and work through the room in a deliberate sequence rather than wandering, because palate fatigue arrives faster than most people expect. Water and plain bread between flights matter more than any technique.
Guides and competitions have grown alongside those events, and a strong showing in a respected Italian guide brings a small producer attention that advertising cannot. That recognition travels through the trade first and reaches drinkers much later, if at all.
Timing explains the calendar. Major tastings cluster in late winter and early spring, after the previous vintage has been assessed and before the growing season absorbs everyone’s attention, and touring producers usually cover several American cities in a single trip. San Francisco, New York and Chicago carry most of that traffic.
Where the club’s record lives now
Celebrations Wine Club selected and shipped California and Italian wine for twenty-five years and stopped shipping in December of 2019. What remains is the written record, including the monthly newsletters that described each selection and the regions behind it. Those pages are the closest thing to a diary of what the club poured.
Readers working through the Italian side of that archive usually find the regional background helpful first. Our overview of Italy’s wine regions lays out how the twenty regions differ, and the companion guide to Italian grapes and styles covers the varieties behind the labels. The newsletter archive keeps the monthly selections in their original form.
Italian labels FAQ
Why does an Italian label often omit the grape?
Because the place name implies it. Within a defined zone the permitted varieties are fixed by the rules, so naming the town is enough for a domestic audience. Producers aiming at export markets increasingly add the grape anyway.
Does a lower tier mean a lesser wine?
No. Some celebrated Italian wines sit in the broadest tier because their producers chose grapes or methods the local rules did not allow. The tier describes conformity with a set of rules rather than the quality of what is in the bottle.
What does riserva mean?
It signals additional aging before release, with the exact minimum set separately for each appellation. It is a time requirement rather than a quality grade, though producers usually reserve their better lots for it.